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Saturday, March 26, 2011

As tradition has it, the university of the President of the Central States Philosophical Association hosts the annual meetings. So, the 2011 meeting will take place in my current hometown St. Louis. Our excellent Vice President, Paul Weirich, Curators' Professor at University of Missouri, Columbia, has just issued the following call for papers:

Central States Philosophical Association (CSPA) 2011 Call for Papers

The 2011 Central States Philosophical Association meeting, hosted by the University of Missouri–St. Louis, will take place at:

Keynote Speakers: John Hawthorne (University of Oxford) and John Doris (Washington University)

You need not be a member of an institution in the central states area to participate. Colloquium papers in any area of philosophy are welcome. Submissions dealing with aspects of John Hawthorne's or John Doris’s work are encouraged. Papers are limited to 3,000 words. All submissions must include on the title page, author information, a word count for the paper, and an abstract (not longer than 150 words). The title page and the paper should be submitted as separate documents. No author-identifying references should appear in the paper. Both the title page and the paper should be submitted as RTF or PDF files.

The program will include panels on these topics:(1) The value problem in epistemology(2) Mind: Physicalism vs. non-physicalism(3) Metaphysics: Natural kinds(4) Intrinsic value(5) Causation(6) Risk

To join a panel, submit a brief proposal of no more than 500 words that advances a point about the panel’s topic. Include a title page in a separate document with author information and the proposal’s word count, and submit both the proposal, prepared for blind reviewing, and the title page as RTF or PDF files. Submitting a panel proposal in addition to colloquium paper is permissible, but at most one will be accepted.

The deadline for submissions is: May 31, 2011.

Submissions should be sent to Leo Yan at: lhybnd@mail.mizzou.edu. Responses to submissions will be sent by July 31, 2011.

Suggestions for commentators and sessions chairs (including self-nominations) are welcome. Information about the meeting’s banquet will be sent out in July.

Suggestions and questions regarding the program should be directed to Paul Weirich at: weirichp@missouri.edu

Questions concerning local arrangements should be directed to Brit Brogaard at: brogaardb@gmail.com

Thursday, March 10, 2011

Brian Weatherson recently called attention to a debate about female representations in volumes and at conferences. Over at TAR, he writes:

Andy Egan and I have (very slowly) put together a collection of papers on epistemic modals and epistemic modality, and it is coming out with OUP this spring. The collection isn’t perfect; it should have come out ages ago, and contributor list is missing a certain something [i.e., female contributors], but we hope it’s a valuable addition to the literature. I’ll hopefully write more about this closer to publication, especially about what I wish I’d done differently along the way to publication.

As I say in my reply to the blog post. I don't want to defend male-only volumes (of course). But, as I say there, in some cases, it is difficult to get women to contribute. On average, an Oxford M&E volume has only 10% contributors. I am not sure whether that reflects the number of women working in M&E. There are 20% women employed in US departments. But they don't all work in M&E. So, I am not sure whether 10% is good or bad. No-women volumes are clearly a bad thing. But the editor is not always to blame.

I also have a confession to make: I actually reviewed Egan and Weatherson's volume proposal for Oxford and regrettedly did not point out that there weren't any female contributors. A friend and former colleague of mine, who is currently employed by a top-university department, has made a habit out of pointing out to the publisher that a volume she is asked to referee should not be published if it does not have a reasonable number of female contributions. I will adhere to her stricter and higher ethical standards in the future.